EXCERPT: “Slamming the final nail in the coffin of everything America used to stand for, the boot-licking U.S. Senate last night gave President Bush the legal authority to abduct and sexually mutilate American citizens and American children in the name of the war on terror. There is nothing in the “detainee” legislation that protects American citizens from being kidnapped by their own government and tortured.

Yale Law Professor Bruce Ackerman states in the L.A. Times, “The compromise legislation….authorizes the president to seize American citizens as enemy combatants, even if they have never left the United States. And once thrown into military prison, they cannot expect a trial by their peers or any other of the normal protections of the Bill of Rights.

Similarly, law Professor Marty Lederman explains: “this [subsection (ii) of the definition of ‘unlawful enemy combatant’] means that if the Pentagon says you’re an unlawful enemy combatant — using whatever criteria they wish — then as far as Congress, and U.S. law, is concerned, you are one, whether or not you have had any connection to ‘hostilities’ at all.”

EXCERPTS: “Medical centres-they cannot be called hospitals-are so few and lack everything, including drugs and medical staff. Doctors are not coming in to work out of fear of being shot since they have been specifically targeted for murder or abductions,” sources said. But the problem is much broader. “Water flows on alternate days. And it is not drinkable. There is little electrical power (two hours a day) and the lack of motor generators means no fridge to preserve food, especially meat.”
“No one is interested in this emergency. The health care system doesn’t practically exist; the government doesn’t exist; not even international organisations are helping us. We are in need of 150 million chlorine tablets to purify water until the end of this year but we do not have that,” a health minister official said.

“Last week the World Health Organisation released data on the cholera outbreak in Iraq. After it first appeared in Kirkuk on August 14, the virus spread to 9 of the country’s 18 provinces with a total 3,315 recorded cases of vibrio cholerae and more than 30,000 cases of acute dysentery. The death rate is low, only 14 for now. Although the outbreak spread to Kirkuk and Sulaymaniah, it has remained stable in Basra, Baghdad, Dahuk, Mosul and Tikrit.”

EXCERPT: “The director of a group that monitors Islamic militant Web sites said the [U.S] government leaked an Osama bin Laden video that was passed along to senior U.S. officials on condition that they keep it secret. She claimed the leak rendered certain intelligence-gathering capabilities ineffective. Rita Katz, who runs the Washington-based SITE Institute, said her decision to pass the video to an official in the Bush administration has had an impact on the ways that the group has for obtaining these videos before they are made available by al-Qaida. Due to the leak, sources that took years to develop are now ineffective,” Katz told The Associated Press today. “A rare window into the world of al-Qaida has now been sealed shut.” She declined to elaborate on whether she meant people or methods.”

“Note for Readers: This is the third in Tomdispatch’s “by the numbers” series, leading up to this week’s White House “Progress Report” from the U.S. commander in Iraq , General David Petraeus, and U.S. ambassador to Iraq , Ryan Crocker. The first, in June, was “Iraq by the Numbers”; the second, in August, was “Escalation by the Numbers.”

UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown has agreed to support US air strikes against Iran if the Islamic republic orchestrates large-scale attacks by militants against British or American forces in Iraq, according to senior Pentagon officials. (Telegraph, UK)

EXCERPT: “Washington sources say the Prime Minister has been informed of US plans to launch limited air and special forces raids against Revolutionary Guard bases. After talks with President George W Bush in July, Mr Brown left US officials with the belief that Britain was “on board” for a military response – but only if Iran was proved to be behind a big militant attack or another stunt similar to the kidnapping in March of British sailors… Mr Brown made clear to Mr Bush that he would not support a campaign to destroy Iran’s nuclear programme and bring about regime change in Teheran.”

Country music legend Willie Nelson, literary icon Gore Vidal, Gold Star Mother Cindy Sheehan, Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg, retired U.S. Army Colonel Ann Wright, former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, former federal prosecutor Elizabeth de la Vega, author and radio host Thom Hartmann, Rabbi Michael Lerner, Rabbi Steven Jacobs, and dozens of other prominent Americans have signed a letter asking the Joint Chiefs of Staff and all U.S. military personnel to refuse orders to launch an aggressive war on Iran. The letter has been posted as a petition for others to sign at dontattackiran.org/ The text of the letter at the link(GlobalResearch)

In case you missed it: Debra Cagan, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Coalition Affairs to Defense Secretary Robert Gates, stated to British members of Parliament “I hate all Iranians“.

EXCERPT: “Moscow proposed setting up a joint naval force of Caspian Sea countries, to be named CasFor, in October 2005. According to the proposal, the five littoral states – Iran, Russia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan – will join efforts to prevent terrorism and trafficking in arms, narcotics and weapons of mass destruction in the Caspian Sea.”

EXCERPT: “The five countries agreed that only the littoral states have the right to access Caspian Sea resources and that the sea should only be used for peaceful purposes. The parties emphasized that under no circumstances would they allow their territories to be used by a third country to carry out military actions against one of the other parties.”

“The statement by the five states also supported the rights of the signatories of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to research, produce and use nuclear energy for peaceful purposes without discrimination and within the framework of the treaty and the IAEA. The parties also agreed to deal with environmental issues and fight terrorism and drug trafficking.”